"So far as the information based on such sources is concerned, all
three of us agreed: (A) Even if the story breaks, it was judged too late
to have a significant impact on the election. (B) The viability of the
man elected as president was involved as well as subsequent relations
between him and President Johnson. (C) Therefore, the common
recommendation was that we should not encourage such stories and hold
tight the data we have."

"our contact with the man in New
York" reported on Election Day, Nov. 5, that Nixon remained nervous
about the election's outcome and thus reneged on his commitment to
Johnson not to exploit the peace-talk stalemate for political gain.

"On the question of the problem with Saigon, he [Nixon] did not stay
with the statesman-like role but pressed publicly the failure of Saigon
to come along as an anti-Democrat political issue."

So, even as Johnson refused to exploit evidence of Nixon's "treason," Nixon
played hardball until the last vote was cast.

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Nixon's Victory

Nixon narrowly prevailed over Humphrey by about 500,000 votes, or less than one percent of the ballots cast.

On the day after the election, Rostow relayed to Johnson another FBI intercept
which had recorded South Vietnamese Ambassador Bui Diem saying, prior
to the American balloting, that he was "keeping his fingers crossed" in
hopes of a Nixon victory.

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On Nov. 7, Rostow passed along another report to Johnson about the thinking of South Vietnam's leaders, with a cover letter that read: "If you wish to get the story raw, read the last paragraph, marked."

That marked paragraph
quoted Major Bui Cong Minh, assistant armed forces attache' at the South
Vietnamese Embassy in Washington, saying about the peace talks: "Major
Minh expressed the opinion that the move by Saigon was to help
presidential candidate Nixon, and that had Saigon gone to the conference
table, presidential candidate Humphrey would probably have won."

The White House also learned that Anna Chennault remained in contact
with Ambassador Bui Diem, including a cryptic conversation on Nov. 7, in
which she told him she had conveyed a message from President Thieu to
"them," presumably a reference to the Nixon team.

"She advised she had given 'them' everything when she finally got back
to her office to call, that 'they' got the whole message. ... Chennault
continued that 'they' are still planning things but are not letting
people know too much because they want to be careful to avoid
embarrassing 'you,' themselves, or the present U.S. government.
Therefore, whatever we do must be carefully planned. ... Chennault added
that Senator John Goodwin Tower had talked to her today. ... and Chennault
and Tower plan to meet [Ambassador] Diem "either Monday.'"

After reading the cable on the morning of Nov. 8, Rostow wrote to
Johnson, "First reactions may well be wrong. But with this information I
think it's time to blow the whistle on these folks." Of course, as the
president-elect, Nixon was now in the driver's seat and there wasn't
anything Johnson could do to change that.

Another report on Nov. 8 described a breakfast meeting between
Ambassador Bui Diem and "a reliable and trustworthy American," who
discussed President Thieu's revised approach to the Paris talks which
"gave the GVN [South Vietnam] a more prominent status than the NLF [Viet
Cong] ... and put negotiations on a Vietnamese-to-Vietnamese basis rather
than a U.S.-to-Vietnamese basis. ...

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"Asked if he [Bui Diem] thought there was much chance of Hanoi's
acceptance, he replied 'no,' but he added that it put the GVN on the
offensive rather than in the position of appearing to scuttle
negotiations."

In other words, the South Vietnamese government was making a public
relations move to ensure the talks would fail but without Thieu getting
the blame. Bui Diem also expressed satisfaction that the U.S. elections
had ousted key anti-war senators, Wayne Morse, Ernest Gruening and
Joseph Clark. [Click here, here and here.]

Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories in the 1980s for the Associated Press and Newsweek. His latest book, Secrecy & Privilege: Rise of the Bush Dynasty from Watergate to Iraq, can be ordered at secrecyandprivilege.com. It's also available at
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